News by Subject Chemistry & Physics

The UK's first energy-positive classroom, designed with research expertise from Swansea University, generated more than one and a half times the energy it consumed, according to data from its first year of operation, the team has revealed. The findings were announced as the researchers launched the next phase of their research, gathering data and evidence on an office building, constructed using similar methods.

Researchers more than doubled the ability of a material to convert heat into electricity, which could help reduce the amount of wasted heat, and thus wasted fossil fuel, in daily activities and industries.

New University of Nottingham research proves that advanced materials containing molecules that switch states in response to environmental stimuli such as light can be fabricated using 3D printing. The study findings have the potential to vastly increase the functional capabilities of 3D-printed devices for industries such as electronics, healthcare and quantum computing.

The research group of NIFS together with collaborators in the United States applied the 'heat pulse modulation method' in the magnetic island produced intentionally in the tokamak 'Doublet III-D.' Temperature gradient inherent in the magnetically confined plasma causes turbulence while there is no turbulence in the magnetic island because of the absence of the gradient. That the turbulence propagates has now been demonstrated for the first time by investigating turbulence in the magnetic island.

Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have found new evidence suggesting that batteries based on sodium and potassium hold promise as a potential alternative to lithium-based batteries.

Rice University engineers have developed a composite binder made primarily of fly ash, a byproduct of coal-fired power plants, that can replace Portland cement in concrete.

Solar energy is clean and abundant, but when the sun isn't shining, you must store the energy in batteries or through a process called photocatalysis. In photocatalytic water splitting, sunlight separates water into hydrogen and oxygen, which can then be recombined in a fuel cell to release energy. Now, a new class of materials -- halide double perovskites -- may have just the right properties to split water, according to research in Applied Physics Letters.